


but for the planets and the stars

by oogenesis



Category: Inazuma Eleven
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-19
Updated: 2018-04-19
Packaged: 2019-04-24 21:04:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,205
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14363655
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oogenesis/pseuds/oogenesis
Summary: Of course they weren't really aliens.  Everyone knows that by now.  But—but—





	but for the planets and the stars

**Author's Note:**

> collapses on the ground finally i post something here. after three months. i still haven't properly watched season 2
> 
> there's some hiromido, if you wanted to know. not enough to tag, i feel

They weren’t actually aliens, of course. That was a pretext. That was the lie that came out and has faded. Of course aliens wouldn’t look like completely normal humans in funny clothes, and it’s dubious they would play soccer. Of course, it was all a charade. Everyone’s used to that fact now. Everyone’s quietly gone back to their normal human lives, except…

…have you ever been in the middle of a meal and suddenly, your mouth is full of stars?

Reina nearly spits out her mouthful of egg and broth but catches herself just in time; she looks around to see if anyone noticed, and decides no one did. The restaurant is a comfortable red-brown dimness, the smell of food and the hubbub of voices stirring and jabbing at the air, and it’s about as Earth of a place as you can get, but for a moment, in her mouth, blue and cool and otherworldly… a silvery singing taste that is unmistakably, once you’ve tasted it, a mouthful of a galaxy.

She eats more slowly after that.

5th period, saturated with boredom, Nagumo taps his pencil against the edge of the desk and taps his feet against the ground and thinks about a planet without school. School is just an Earth thing. It's so _dumb_. Why should he have to be here? Up on the blackboard is a diagram of this planet’s tectonic plates and their motion; he thinks longingly of volcanoes, of an orange-ash sky, the magma flows like rivers and the ground glowingly cracked. Burn, he thinks, the name a comforting pulse in his head, burn burn burn, and his pencil taps to the rhythm of red-hot meteors piercing the ground.

It snows one night, a record-breaking depth, and the world the next morning is sculpted in glittering white, icicles hanging like claws from branches. Suzuno's steps slow as he trudges through the snow in the boots he shouldn't need; his breath mists sparkling in the air and he thinks of diamond dust. Something about this is familiar to his bones; his reflection catching in the icicles, the cold air stinging and singing on his bare skin. The world seems foreign to itself, ordinary landmarks made strange with the ice, and he wishes it were always this way; this cold quiet landscape feels more like home to him than the human life he lives in.

Walking back one evening after practice, the winter sky spangled and dotted with home, their fingers brushing, Hiroto quietly says, _I think I want to kiss you_ , and Midorikawa tilts his head inward and says, _You mean, like humans do?_

 _Like humans do_ , agrees Hiroto against his nose and mouth, and then there’s the birth of a star in the cold air of that night.

(Kariya will grow up in a home with stardust piled in the corners, galaxies lagging in his footsteps when his mind wanders. _My dads are aliens,_ he’ll say when he’s feeling particularly bold, and he will say it with unshakable certainty every time.)

True, perhaps, they weren’t aliens themselves. They were born on Earth, citizens of it by birth, a product of this planet—but the Aliea meteorite was anything but. This is well-documented fact. There are science reports and news articles to back up that yes, this rock that smashed into the side of Mt. Fuji years ago was extraterrestrial in origin, that it contained unknown chemical compounds, possibly signs of another form of life. And this is what they took into their bodies, inhaled the dust of, ground into their morning cereal like sparkling purple sugar. They took it into their bodies and their bodies built it into themselves, into the cells of their muscles and bones; gave them extraterrestrial strength. They are made partly of stardust now. Can they be denied a connection to the universe outside of Earth? Is it not natural for that newly celestial part of them to want to return home? 

_Remember when we were aliens?_ It's always that, never _pretended_ or _played at_ or _said we were_ , and this will not change even when they grow up into the mundane adult world and leave the realm of children’s fantasy behind. Remember when we were, for a short time, aliens? Remember when we burst the bounds of these weak human bodies and took to space, dancing among the stars, breathing nebula dust? High above all those humans confined to their single wet sphere, laughing at their limitations, do you remember, do you remember—

Reina grew lethargic and low on energy after the Aliea incident was all over. That should have been a warning to the rest of them. Without the adrenaline of the FFI, there is nothing to keep them going through the withdrawal from the meteorite, and in the weeks afterward they all begin to fall. Hiroto, who burned himself out the hardest pushing all the way to finals, bows out first, complaining of nausea during practice; Midorikawa, Nagumo and Haruya follow suit. Dizziness, chest tightness, violent trembling. Not as fast or as strong as they were before it all happened. The Aliea meteorite pushed their bodies past the limit of human ability, straining their hearts and lungs and muscles to the utmost, and now they must pay the price.

Saginuma holds out the longest, gritting his teeth through the shooting cramps and the lightheadedness, until one day during practice the world goes liquid and the next thing he sees is the ceiling of a hospital room, lit by the sunset of several hours later. Whispers come from the other side of the door. _Unethical. Beyond unethical, even… could have killed them if he kept it up… bound to be adverse effects, and yet he… children, barely teenagers…_ A doctor comes into the room and tells him the same thing Saginuma knows he told the others; absolutely no sports or major exertion until full recovery, which will take months. Maybe even years. Here is a list of medications and dietary needs until then. Saginuma closes his eyes, drifts off, and dreams of sitting on a comet travelling away from Earth, the electric blue tail arcing behind him, headed home. Heading home.

Where is home? They are all orphans, abandoned children left stranded and exposed on the face of an uncaring planet. Searching for somewhere to belong—sitting under the stars, pointing up at the night sky, at the gaps in constellations, at the spaces where planets would be. _Hey, do you think I came from there? Or that star, there!_ No place has ever claimed them that could prove them wrong. Might as well be aliens. Might as well claim ancestry from another world.

Spring on Earth, a straggling group of high schoolers walking out of the stadium. Flush with the thrill of watching a game instead of playing in it, debating what they’d have done differently in each player’s position. _But you know,_ says Midorikawa, caught up in the flow of conversation, _Earth has a saying—_

Endou nudges him. _Hey, hey, you’re not an alien anymore, remember? You’re from Earth yourself!_

Somewhere far overhead, hidden behind the daylight, a shooting star flashes across the sky.

 _Oh,_ says Midorikawa, and laughs. _You’re right, I forgot._

**Author's Note:**

> title from the stand by mother mother lol
> 
> comments are highly appreciated as always!


End file.
